Friday, 3 February 2012

Food Hero's

My favourite chef would have to be Jamie Oliver. I just love everything about him. His recipes are always really hearty, full flavoured and pretty simple to follow.

Every Boxing day I always use his gammon recipe. It's really easy to do and doesn't require much attention. Firstly, you need to boil the gammon with orange skins, the juice of the orange, peppercorns, leaks, carrots, thyme, and rosemary. Once you've boiled it for around an hour you cut off most of the skin then criss-cross the remaining fat. Place in the oven for 20 mins so the fat can render (I can't remember the exact temperature, but it's probably around 190 degrees). Then remove the gammon, pepper it generously and cover with marmalade, then place back in the oven for an hour. All you then need to do is baste it occasionally. It really is delicious and can be eaten cold too.

I got Jamie's new book for Christmas. I'm most looking forward to cooking his empire chicken recipe, it looks amazing, a great take on a Sunday roast. Chicken is something I go through stages of loving and not really bothering with, I just hate plain chicken.

Another one of my favourite chefs would be Gordon Ramsey, I guess I love his showmanship the most. Thinking about it, I haven't ever cooked one of his recipes?! But he's great to watch. Recently I have been re-watching his kitchen nightmares series. I forgot just how hilarious they are. Actually, I've eaten in one of the restaurants he helped turn around - Silversmiths, in Sheffield. It was great, perhaps the portions were slightly small for the price, but it had good ideas and has recently made the new addition of the Good Food guide, so they are obviously doing something right!

Delia Smith is also someone I love. I own her 'bible.' Basically if you need to know how to cook ANYTHING you can find it in this book. Her summer collections book is also great. She has a recipe for halloumi with capers, lime and parsley which is so good.